This invention relates to suction-irrigation equipment.
The invention is more particularly concerned with suction-irrigation equipment for hand-held medical use, such as, of the kind used for cleaning wounds during surgery.
One form of suction irrigator has a handle provided with two conduits connected respectively to a source of irrigating fluid and a suction source. The suction irrigator has a valve assembly connected to the conduits, and a single outlet that can be connected to one or the other of the conduits by operation of the valve assembly so that the outlet can be used to supply irrigating fluid or to apply suction. Preferably, the equipment is made at low cost of a plastics material so that it can be discarded after a single use.
In order to ensure reliable, leak-proof operation, the valve assembly must be made accurately to small tolerances; if of plastics material it can be made by injection moulding. The disadvantage of this, however, is that this is a relatively costly process especially for large mouldings. Since the handle of the suction irrigator must be sufficiently long to fit comfortably and securely in the hand of the user, this makes the entire equipment fairly large, and consequently expensive to make by accurate moulding techniques, such as, injection moulding.